President Obama welcomed President Nicolas Sarkozy of France to the White House, saying that he is working with President Sarkozy to sustain the global economic recovery and create jobs.
France assumed the 12-month rotating presidency of the G20 in November. In 2010, President Sarkozy discussed the millennium development goals calling for a global tax on financial transactions to help reduce poverty and the need to involve the private sector in meeting its 2015 goals. In 2000, at a U.N. summit, world leaders adopted eight millennium goals to cut global poverty in half by 2015.
Also during the visit, the two Presidents discussed a broad range of current foreign policy and security issues.